The sins of science fiction

Before we jump into this, I'm not referring to the Scale of Scientific Sins. What I'm referring to is the role of actual science in science fiction, and how it relates to how "hard" or "soft" your scifi is.

Okay, now let's all be honest. Science fiction is fucking cool. It presents us with the kind of impossible things you could only see in fantasy, like massive dogfights in outer space, laser swords, warp drives, cloning, superpowers made possible by cybernetic implants and genetic engineering. It gives us these amazing things, and then presents us with the cruelest and most enticing of lures, the promise that one day we will be able to do these things. We will have the technology.

Of course anyone who takes the time to think about it is going to realize this is complete horseshit. No matter how much you want to be Senator Armstrong, nanomachines will never work that way and cyborgs will never physically throw giant robots into the air with their bare hands. In a similar vein, extrasensory perception and other psychic abilities almost always spit fire in the face of physics, and there's just no way you're going to get that giant mech to support its own weight if it's walking on two legs. You're never going to get to meet any aliens either, so keep dreaming. Everyone knows this, even if they want to deny it. But the trick to making it work is making it seem real enough that people either don't question it, or don't care. That's why science fiction is still as popular as it is. It's just believable enough in how it explains why this stuff is possible that you give it a pass without laughing at it.

But what's believable? What strains believability? Obviously this varies from person to person and some are going to have harsher criteria for their scifi, but generally successful scifi strikes a balance where it explains how stuff works without drawing too much attention to what makes it implausible.

So, in your opinion, what is that balance? How much explanation is enough, and how much is too much? How much can the audience infer by themselves? How much technobabble is enough to make technology seem like actual technology without exposing the fundamental errors (or in many cases, neglect) in the author's understanding of physics?^note The exceptions to this last statement are, of course, the most anal-retentive writers of hard scifi, but no one asked them for their opinion anyway since they're by all rights writing technical manuals, not fiction.

edited 24th Apr '14 9:23:31 AM by KSPAM

Physics chauvinism. Larry Niven once requested that his story be pulled from print because of a math error, then wrote another based on the premise that humans descend from some space aliens. Because they just accidentally would evolve such a similar biochemical mechanism of inheritance that it would be indistinguishable from native Earthly genetics.

Personally, I feel that psychic powers have no place in science fiction. They are, literally, pure fantasy.

In a more direct answer to the question, what really bothers me is unnecessary bad science. If a plot revolves around "magic" nanomachines, I can accept that as part of the plot, but I'd be annoyed if some more minor element (say, spacecraft) is portrayed in a completely unrealistic fashion. I'd never ask for perfect scientific accuracy on anything (mostly because I'd never try and achieve it myself), but I think there is a certain minimal level needed to avoid seeming lazy.

Other than that, the other thing that's really important is internal consistency.

On a separate note, as far as explaining things to the audience goes, I feel like less is definitely more. Expospeak is just obnoxious. The only things whose function you really need to explain are the ones that are relevant to the plot; everything else can be left for fan inference or maybe some kind of supplementary material.

edited 24th Apr '14 11:02:11 AM by nrjxll

Fun thing about psychic powers is that they are pure fantasy now, but have been science fiction not that long ago. Alan Turing, when he formulated the rules of the Turing Test, saw fit to include a clause that the test be properly shielded from telepathy, in case it was proved real.

As for me, I'm a bit annoyed by the idea that once somebody invents a sentient computer, MAGIC HAPPENS and the next moment, we're suddenly extradimensional flying superhumans. Apparently it would revoke physics, or some shit like that. Luckily it seems to be more notorious than common.

edited 24th Apr '14 11:19:06 AM by lordGacek

"Other than that, the other thing that's really important is internal consistency."

That. What matters is that an author declare where his/her story fits on the Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness (ideally via the opening scene) and then sticks to that throughout the story. If you are writing a story that is Science In Genre Only then stick to the conventions which are appropriate for that genre, or if you are writing Speculative Science, then stick to that.

Hey, when a hobbyist in Alaska builds a fully functional mobile suit standing much taller than a man, it's not a matter of impossible. It's a matter of "do we want to?". (The answer is of course "yes".)

Materials science will eventually advance to the point to where if we want to build a 1:1 scale replica of the RX-78 Gundam we can do so.

Fair enough. I suppose anything can become plausible the further into the future you are

Will it ever be a practical battle weapon?

Probably not

To name one point, what kinda bothers me is how most science fiction warfare actually represents a technological and tactical regression from the present day. Like in Star Wars, how the capital ships use the strategic equivalent of 17th Century naval warfare. Admittedly that's a science fantasy franchise, so you can forgive it for the sake of Ruleof Cool, but I object when it is presented as science fiction.

edited 24th Apr '14 5:44:55 PM by gingerman

Yeah, thanks for reminding me: I really hate Recycled In Space. It's one thing to try and create resonance with some historical or present time period, but all-out-copypasting in any setting that tries even feebly to represent a future following from the present drives me nuts.

You think it was bad in Star Wars? Try on Glass Fleet for size. Or how about Legend Of The Galactic Heroes.

Anyway, if I were the writer, I would not write science fiction and do a space fantasy instead. Or make sure what I'm writing about is within the realm of scientific possibility. Better to admit to breaking the laws of physics than make a pretense of adhering to them and fail.

edited 24th Apr '14 7:03:32 PM by shiro_okami

You're making assumptions based on technologies existant rather than technologies future. Part of the sanity check you should always apply before you make such pronouncements is to check the limits of the setting's FTL and how it shapes the tactical landscape.

My personal favorite example on this front has always been Free Space, which depicts a world of heavily armed, short-ranged, slow ships fighting single-ship actions. This makes perfect sense because Free Space subspace jump drive provides instant access to any location not inside an planetary atmosphere in a system. They are slow and short-ranged because they do not have to be fast or armed with long-ranged weapons when they can place themselves as far away from the target as they like instantly. They fight single-ship actions because if you try to concentrate too much force against an opponent then they will simply jump away. The style of combat in the game is completely nonsensical to modern eyes, but it makes perfect sense given the technologies of the setting.

Something very similar can be said of Star Wars.

That's kind of circular reasoning though, since very often with a Recycled In Space story, the future technologies are specifically designed by the author to justify hir retrograde setting.

Which is irrelevant; that's a personal issue you have with a concept rather than an overt sin of poor storytelling.

It might be irrelevant to gingerman's point about space warfare, but my position is that Recycled In Space on its own is poor storytelling. I think it's usually lazy worldbuilding and can telegraph a story. And to go back to the subject of this thread, it tends to strain my believability regardless of the Watsonian justification for it.

edited 24th Apr '14 10:23:49 PM by nrjxll

It very literally cannot be poor storytelling.

The boundaries between us and an interstellar society are, like the boundaries between us and FTL or AI, very much conceptual rather than physical. As such, we cannot reasonably claim we know what it will look like, and thus anything can be justified. If the conditions pertaining have sufficient macro similarity to a system of government or society from the past, people will notice, and may choose to adopt it. A society with poor communications and taking a long time to deploy troops or disaster relief assets may very well look quite feudal in the nature of its government. One with a resource others do not have may adopt a mercantilist outlook. These are far from unreasonable things. If the world is internally consistent, then you are simply tilting at windmills here.

edited 24th Apr '14 10:39:20 PM by Night

When has this actually occurred in real life? I can completely accept that the nature of interstellar travel might lead to a decentralized power structure resembling feudalism, for instance, but there's no automatic leap from that to reinstating a hereditary aristocracy, trial by combat, a powerful monolithic church, and medieval nomenclature. And that's the sort of thing I'm objecting to - what I call "full" Recycled In Space, taking not just a single element but an entire historical era and setting it down in space.

I've pretty much come to the conclusion that I do not really care that realistically we cannot have these things. Because, frankly, reality as we know it freaking sucks. That we'll never have these things used to depress me. Because reality is just that lame.

But I will keep thinking, keep dreaming that we will have them. We will meet an alien. I will eventually romp around in a Metal Gear.

Because its absurd. Because its fallacious horseshit. I think, I dream, to spit in reality's face.

People spent centuries trying and failing with various levels of accuracy to resurrect the Roman Empire. Even people who were never a part of it, such as Russia. The Meiji Restoration is another example.

A poor explanation is worse than none.

Explaining that your giant mecha are able to stand using positronic molecular energy can be worse than simply not mentioning it- after all, it's unlikely anyone watching or reading will stop reading just because of the lack of it. They came for giant mecha. It's like how no one reading Harry Potter starts complaining about how it breaks the laws of physics.

edited 25th Apr '14 11:29:10 AM by Matues

The key words are trying and failing. That sort of thing is exactly what I'm thinking of when I say Recycled In Space is unrealistic, in fact - while we may not know anything about what an interstellar civilization would be like, a look at history suggests that people simply don't revive historical forms of society as thoroughly as the sort of RIS setting I'm objecting to requires.

They failed because they lacked either means or proper understanding. Not because it wasn't adaptable to their situation.

And that doesn't address the Meiji Restoration, either.

The Meiji Restoration is an even worse example. There was a fair amount of rhetoric about restoring Japanese government and society to its pre-shogunate state, but with a few exceptions (most of them at a pretty broad level), the rhetoric didn't really match reality. There were more new things introduced than old things brought back.

Sanity check? Personally, I think it's just silly. You can come up with all the justifications you want - shield tech, pros and cons of futuristic weapons and whatnot - but the presentation of "big things shoot the crap out of each other in space" is so simplistic. It worked when I was a kid, but these days I'm more impressed by a writer or director actually figuring out the reasons why space warfare is waged in their preferred method. Exchanging broadsides in high orbit in a massive high-tech mosh pit? I seriously doubt that the finest strategic minds in the universe couldn't think of a better way to minimize losses of rather expensive looking kilometer-sized spacecraft and maximize their output of damage. Fleet actions in formations? The deployment of weapons more specialized than "a much bigger laser"? Ship classes beyond fighter, destroyer, battleship, super-battleship? All I'm after is a little thought. And as a critical person, I call a lack of thought poor storytelling.

But hey, that's just me. People do disagree on what compromises a narrative's viability.

edited 25th Apr '14 6:37:47 PM by gingerman

Guys, when it comes to the "sins" of science fiction Star Wars is a non-example. SW isn't Sci-Fi...it's fantasy. In the films none of the "technology" present is ever explained; its just used. Lightsabers, blasters, spaceships, hyperdrives...it is all basically magic.

Besides, there are swords, wizards, and a plot arc more reminiscent of Lord of the Rings than anything Heinlein ever dreamed up. When I watch SW I'm more reminded of every Dungeons & Dragons game I played as a teenager than anything else. Fuck, the main protagonists all meet in a freaking tavern.

The first film even states it outright at the beginning...anyone remember "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away"? It's a fantasy series. The fact that it takes place in "space" does not detract from that. in SW, "space" is just as made-up as Middle Earth.

If y'all really want to put a classic franchise in the pillory for science sins, go after Star Trek.

edited 25th Apr '14 6:41:58 PM by drunkscriblerian